US ARMY
QUARTERMASTER CENTER & SCHOOL

Historical Vignettes

ORIGIN OF THE HAND SALUTE

No one knows the precise origin of todays hand salute. From earliest times and in
many distant armies throughout history, the right hand (or "weapon hand") has
been raised as a greeting of friendship. The idea may have been to show that you weren't
ready to use a rock or other weapon. Courtesy required that the inferior make the gesture
first. Certainly there is some connection between this old gesture and our present salute.

One romantic legend has it that todays military salute descended from the
medieval knight's gesture of raising his visor to reveal his identity as a courtesy on the
approach of a superior. Another even more fantastic version is that it symbolizes a
knight's shielding his eyes from the dazzling beauty of some high-born lady sitting in the
bleachers of the tournament.

The military salute has in fact had many different forms over the centuries. At one
time it was rendered with both hands! In old prints one may see left-handed salutes. In
some instances the salute was rendered by lowering the saber with one hand and touching
the cap visor with the other.

The following explanation of the origin of the hand salute is perhaps closest to the
truth: It was a long-established military custom for juniors to remove their headgear in
the presence of superiors. In the British Army as late as the American Revolution a
soldier saluted bv removing his hat. But with the advent of more cumbersome headgear in
the 18th and 19th centuries, the act of removing ones hat was
gradually converted into the simpler gesture of grasping the visor, and issuing a
courteous salutation. From there it finally became conventionalized into something
resembling our modern hand salute.

As early as 1745 (more than two-and-a-half centuries ago) a British order book states
that: "The men are ordered not to pull off their hats when they pass an officer, or
to speak to them, but only to clap up their hands to their hats and bow as they
pass."

Whatever the actual origin of todays hand salute, clearly in the tradition of the
US Army it has always been used to indicate a sign of RESPECT  further
recognition that in the profession of arms military courtesy is both a right and a
responsibility of every soldier.